Welp. Got my first game over thanks to Primrose's random dance ability rolling first the "reduce your entire party's HP to 1" effect followed by the "blow the party up" effect. JP x 10/Exp x 5 is still worth the potential self-owning (love to pull an Exp x 5 on a Cait battle :holy:).

Other things of interest:

Had H'aanit beat up a dude above her weight class (six star thingies) thanks to some choice picks with monsters and stacking Evade like mad.

Started a party train of six people thanks to having both Ophelia and Primrose in the party.

Captured a Cait (no idea what exactly it does, but the fucker was worth mad Exp, so I'm keeping it and hopefully there will be a quest down the road that requires it).

Finally started last night after several hiccups along the way. Picked Primrose because she's hot....damn her story is fucked up. So far my only complaint is the annoying battle dialogue. She must have said "I am ready" about 200 times last night. Every friggin round she wasn't debilitated or low health she said it, and let's be fair it's not often either of those are likely. Minor grievance really. I don't dislike the graphical style, but considering the types of characters so far a part of me really wishes this had been done in a more contemporary 3d style. I mean I just got Olberic and he's supposed to be some hulking knight....and he's the same size as Primrose. It takes away from the feel a little bit. Also the voice acting thus far is pretty on point, but I've never been a fan of the logic of having a voice say something like "Um" but the dialogue clearly states a long worded question. Always found that lazy or silly. Nothing to shit on the game about specifically, as the gameplay so far has been pretty fantastic. The combat is fairly interesting while being simple, and much like Aeolus, I find myself abusing the bewildering dance for jp and exp bonuses. I don't think this will be my favorite rpg, but it's pretty damn good so far.

I'm going with my gut on this and skipping. I might start Trails in the sky 1.

I was playing that before jumping to octopath. Octopath is vastly more fun, but tits may have better story so far....I'm too early to call it yet. I only have primrose and olberic, both have coolish story starts but idk where they'll go to.

Cleared Ophilia's Chapter 2 twice (once to advance the story and again to see all the party skits; although I still need to see Alfin's take).

Things of note:

Found an old guy hopelessly lost in the river valley. Guided him back to his grandson, then immediately dragged him off to a side dungeon followed by the Chapter 2 River Town before letting him loose. I'm sure he'll find his way home just fine.

Beat up a giant moth.

Gave my thief a chemistry set.

Replaced the old man with an Archbishop. Who I then had to boot out of my party in favor of a snot nosed orphan, who ran off to the woods to feed himself and his friend to the wolves. Which led me back to the Archbishop to go into the woods with me (sadly I was not able to visually confirm if he shits in the woods or not).

For the second run, I bought a spooky Forbidden Staff for Ophilia. She was doing about 2k in damage to all enemies under a full boost before Break status. Peacock Dance and/or Break increased it to 3k.

Random dancing resulted in a fuckoff Golem punching a dire wolf in the face for 9999 damage.

(Edit: Corrected) Skits in order of appearance for Ophilia Chapter 2:

Cyrus > Alfyn > Primrose > Tressa > H'aanit > Therion > Olberic

If you don't want to beat the boss a second time, drag Therion and Olberic with you for your progress run.